SpaceX tests engines ahead of Tuesday Falcon 9 rocket launch

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket blasted off last May with a classified mission for the National Reconnaissance Office. On Friday, SpaceX test-fired the same booster's nine main engines in preparation for a targeted Tuesday afternoon launch of GovSat-1 from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.(Photo: SpaceX)

SpaceX's successful test-firing of Falcon 9 rocket engines Friday cleared the way for a planned launch as soon as Tuesday afternoon of a European communications satellite from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.

It was the second time in three days that SpaceX tested Merlin rocket engines on the Space Coast, bringing to 36 the number of engines fired tested during the week.

On Wednesday, 27 engines powering SpaceX's new Falcon Heavy rocket rumbled to life at Kennedy Space Center's pad 39A. The rocket is being readied for a demonstration launch as soon as Feb. 6 that, if successful, would make it the most powerful rocket flying today.

On Friday at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station's Launch Complex 40, SpaceX performed its standard pre-launch countdown rehearsal and static-fire test for the Falcon 9 set to launch the GovSat-1. The communications satellite will be operated by LuxGovSat, a partnership between the Luxembourg government and SES.

Liftoff is targeted for 4:25 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 30, the opening of a more than two-hour window. The forecast is iffy, with a 40 percent chance of acceptable weather because of gusting winds.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration satellite called GOES-S had arrived in December. GOES is short for Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite.

The satellite is the second of four in NOAA’s next-generation series offering more detailed and frequent views of Earth to help forecasters predict severe weathe, from thunderstorms to hurricanes to wildfires.

The first spacecraft in the series, GOES-R (renamed GOES-16 in orbit), launched in November 2016 and is positioned over the East Coast. GOES-S, which will be renamed GOES-17, will be placed over the West Coast.

Launch of the Atlas V carrying GOES-S is scheduled for 5:02 p.m. EST March 1 from Launch Complex 41. The mission is ULA's third of the year.

Spacewalkers to replace robotic arm's hand

NASA astronaut Scott Tingle is pictured during a spacewalk on Jan. 23, 2018, to swap out a degraded robotic hand, or Latching End Effector, on the Canadarm2. NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei also participated in the robotics maintenance spacewalk.(Photo: NASA)

Update: Monday's spacewalk has been postponed. Over the weekend, Canadian Space Agency engineers came up with a software patch that may solve the trouble with new robotic arm's hand.

Original story: International Space Station spacewalkers on Monday may need to undo the work achieved during an excursion last week.

On Tuesday, Jan. 23, NASA astronauts Mark Vande Hei and Scott Tingle installed a new hand on the station’s 58-foot robotic arm to address wear and tear on the original.

But after the astronauts attached the spare hand, which had launched aboard a shuttle in 2001, ground teams were only able to activate one of two electrical systems that control its movement.

To ensure the hand has backup capacity if one system failed, spacewalkers on Monday, Jan. 29, will remove the just-installed hand and replace it with the original.

"Even though it is showing initial signs of wear and tear, both of this hand’s systems are functional," the Canadian Space Agency said.

Among its many critical functions, the Canadian-built arm called Canadarm2 use its hand to grapple visiting cargo vehicles including SpaceX's Dragon and Orbital ATK's Cygnus.

Vande Hei and Japanese astronaut Norishige Kanai are scheduled to exit the station just after 7 a.m. Monday to start a more than six-hour spacewalk. You can watch the action live on NASA TV.

If it proceeds as planned, the spacewalk could be the first of two this week. Russian cosmonauts plan to work outside the laboratory complex orbiting 250 miles up on Friday, Feb. 2.

Rocket Lab's Electron launches 'Humanity Star'

A new man-made star is shining over Earth, courtesy of a small rocket that might one day fly from the Space Coast.

Rocket Lab’s Electron rocket blasted off from New Zealand on Jan. 21, achieving orbit on its second test flight, which was named “Still Testing.”

The company later revealed that the rocket had deployed what it calls the Humanity Star, a carbon fiber geodesic sphere with 65 reflective panels expected to make it the brightest object in the night sky, visible to the naked eye. It will orbit every 90 minutes until dropping from space and burning up in the atmosphere in about nine months.

“My hope is that all those looking up at it will look past it to the vast expanse of the universe and think a little differently about their lives, actions and what is important for humanity,” said Rocket Lab founder and CEO Peter Beck. “For us to thrive and survive, we need to make big decisions in the context of humanity as a whole, not in the context of individuals, organizations or even nations.”

Rocket Lab says the satellite will be most visible in the U.S. starting in March. Its location can be tracked in real-time at TheHumanityStar.com.

The Electron rocket is designed to launch small satellites that currently must hitch rides as secondary missions on much larger rockets.

Beck has visited Kennedy Space Center and Cape Canaveral Air Force Station to scout potential Florida launch sites if market demand grows as he anticipates.

Contact Dean at 321-242-3668 or jdean@floridatoday.com. And follow on Twitter at @flatoday_jdean and on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/FlameTrench.